You save the equivalent in dollars of the week that it is. Yes, I know my explanation sounds confusing, so here’s how you do it:

Week one, you save one dollar; week two, two dollars, week three, three dollars, and so forth, until you reach week 52.

At that point you put $52 in savings for the 52nd week and you have a total of $1,378.00!

I found this really interesting because, for the most part, these aren’t huge lumps of money, especially in the beginning. The program, broken into weeks, seems doable to me. While the later weeks see you saving higher amounts of money, it also has you closer to reaching your goal.

I also like that the plan is laid out and tells you specifically what you have to do each week, and that the amounts get higher as you go. This gets you used to putting money in savings each week, so that when the amounts do get a bit higher you are already adjusted to taking money out of your check to put into savings. The only issue I see, which I know would be a problem for me: Forgetting about the plan halfway through, thinking I’ll make the deposit and not doing so, etc.

This challenge could be used to save for a variety of things, such as:

School items for the new school year (clothes, books, backpacks, papers, pencils, and then extra money to keep throughout the year for new shoes, new clothes, etc as the seasons change)

Daycare

Activities the kids do, like dance and soccer

Assistance with medical bills

A family vacation

Here are a few tips to make this work!

Talk about the plan with your spouse/significant other. Make sure they are on board.

Figure out where you are going to put this money. In the bank? This may be the best place, so it doesn’t get touched. (I will admit to dipping into the kids’ banks at times when I’m low on cash, and while I always try to remember to pay them back I’m sure this hasn’t always happened!) The problem: Getting there each week to make the deposit.

Get everyone involved. Each week when you make the deposit, have the kids total up the amount you have saved. If you are counting down to, say, a family vacation or something else the kids might be interested in, keep a chart to see where you are in your savings.

Get your kids involved with their own money. To teach kids about savings, how about making their own challenge? Obviously their challenge would be to save much less. But what if they begin by putting a penny, a nickel, a dime, a quarter, fifty cents, and so forth into their own banks and tracking what they save? This is a great way to teach kids to save, especially if you are also doing this as a family.

I’m interested to know if you have taken the 52 Week Challenge found on Facebook, or if you have done some other type of money savings challenge in the past? Did it work? Did you keep up with it throughout the number of weeks?

52 Week Money Challenge: Tips for Making it Work

Kathy Murdock works as a full time writer and web designer. Recently planted in the middle of the deep south from the busy streets of Los Angeles, when she's not coding Wordpress websites or writing about women in business and thrifty motherhood, Kathy spends time photographing alligators, playing with her family, and running. ... More

I think this is great! I hate to spend and or SAVE money… it always seems gone before it can be saved. There is always a stupid bill that comes in the mail the same week I am trying to $50 in the savings. This way I can do a little at a time and increase it on weeks I have it! Thank you!

Fantastic and fun way to save. I am trying to get my husband and I each to do the challenge and between the both of us we can Save $2756. Also thought it would be good way to start an allowance for the kids. Start it on their birthday and every week add to the bank and at the end of one year take the savings to place in their savings bank account. All kinds of options to do with this.

I have been doing this since the beginning of the year and I now have almost 300 dollars saved in a savings account that I do not touch and don’t even think about until I have to make an online transfer to that account. I love that I started this and will continue to do it for years to come.

Cool idea!!! One thing I’ve always done is when I use coupons, which is pretty frequent (no I’m not a coupon queen) I always wrote the check over the amount for what I saved in coupons then stuck away. That worked for two years and then we used the money for moving expenses when we moved out of state and also for 1st & last on a house we rented. THAT felt great

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